53 And 54, Bentley Corner

A pair of cottages situated in Brentwood, dating back to the 17th century, with subsequent alterations in the 19th and 20th centuries. The cottages are timber-framed and primarily weatherboarded, featuring a low-pitched slated roof. They have a rectangular plan, extending across one and a half storeys, with rendered gable end stacks. A lean-to out-shut is located to the west of a lesser stack, and a 20th-century weatherboarded porch fronts it. A gabled ground-floor extension to the north, also from the 20th century, projects slightly.

The east front of No. 53 features, on the south end, a 19th-century two-light metal casement window with 6x4 panes on the ground floor, and a 20th-century two-light wooden casement with 4x3 panes above. The north end has 20th-century single two-light wooden casements on both the ground and first floors. Additional 20th-century work at both ends projects forward. The south wall is red brick, while the roof is a mix of pantiles and corrugated asbestos cement. A 20th-century two-light casement and boarded door are on the front. The interior door is 19th-century and boarded. The north addition is weatherboarded with a slate roof, and has a 20th-century door framed with two panels. The rear west elevation is rendered.

No. 54 has a 20th-century two-light casement window and a No. 53 door with four panels. A south lean-to incorporates brickwork, a metal two-light casement window with 4x3 panes, and a weatherboarded north addition. A ground-floor weatherboarded gable addition on the north end features two 20th-century casement windows. This gable reveals a lower roofline indicating an earlier house and projecting wall plates level with the underside of the upper window sills.

Internally, the cottages show the original house form. The north end ground floor contains a fireplace approximately 3 meters wide with a timber lintel, and centrally located binding joists, chamfered with simple stops. The first floor displays wall plates at original window heights and an original tie-beam in the north gable wall. A tie-beam with rising arched brace runs between both cottages. The interior of the south end wall on the first floor shows a mark indicating an old roof line stopping at collar level, suggesting a possible half-hipped gable at the south end. A 19th-century fireplace was added to the rear of a large stack at the north end when the house was raised. In No. 54, a C17 moulded panel door is found on the outside end gable doorway prior to a 20th-century addition. The house originally comprised two cells, one and a half storeys, with an end chimney and probable end gable entry. In the early 19th century, the house was raised and given its present frontage, with an additional fireplace added at the north end. The south end then had fireplaces and a stack built, which incorporated a ground floor fireplace facing the out-shut. A bake oven was reportedly located at the north end, but traces of this have been obscured by later work.